


But You Don't Have to Fear It

by Mount_Seleya



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Anal Sex, Betaed, Bossy Sherlock, Bottom Sherlock, Crying During Sex, Dacryphilia, Dominant John, M/M, Not Britpicked, Pain Kink, Painful Sex, Patient John, Sherlock Kink Meme, Sherlock Learns His Body Is More Than Just Transport, Stubborn Sherlock, Thinky Sex, Top John
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-11
Updated: 2014-08-11
Packaged: 2018-02-12 15:52:08
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,671
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2115786
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mount_Seleya/pseuds/Mount_Seleya
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sherlock finds his first time with John extremely painful and can't stop crying during it. But, being Sherlock, he's determined to bully through the pain and tears, and John, though reluctant, is willing to give him what he wants.</p><p>
  <b>Please note that this fic features Sherlock crying and experiencing pain during sex, and while everything is intended to be consensual on both sides, it might be triggering to some readers.</b>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	But You Don't Have to Fear It

**Author's Note:**

> This was written for an [anonymous prompt](http://sherlockbbc-fic.livejournal.com/22393.html?thread=131987577#t131987577) on the Sherlock BBC Prompting Meme.
> 
> Thanks to [Solitary_Endeavor](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Solitary_Endeavor) for the beta read.

It wasn't supposed to be like this. Sherlock had expected pain, yes, but not _this_. Not raw burning agony. And John had been so thorough, so gentle and patient with the preparation, carefully slicking and stretching him.  
  
"Just breathe, love," John whispers, mouthing at his neck. "It'll get better. Promise."  
  
But Sherlock can't. There's an incubus sitting on his chest. Crushing the air out of his lungs. Red smears across the darkness behind his tightly-closed eyes, like a light leak in a poorly-taken photograph. His arms cinch tighter around John's shoulders, and his hands skitter across the smooth, sweat-slick plane of John's back.  
  
"Oh, Jesus, you're tight." The tip of John's nose nudges Sherlock's jaw. "Just breathe. It's alright. I've got you."  
  
Sherlock forces himself to draw a shallow, shuddering breath, expelling it in a series of gasping puffs.  
  
"Sherlock?" John's voice is soft with concern. "Talk to me, love. If you want, we can stop. We don't have to do this."  
  
"I _want_ to," Sherlock snarls through clenched teeth. It's the truth: he's wanted John longer than he can remember. And now that they're finally together in the most profound, intimate way, he's not going to be put off by something as surmountable as pain, not when he's borne torture and cardiac arrest and near-exile to get here.  
  
After a moment, John seems to accept Sherlock's stubborn resolve, and drags his cock from Sherlock's body. Sherlock clamps his jaw shut to keep from crying out as John rocks into him again, establishing a slow, easy rhythm. By the tenth thrust, there are tears rolling down Sherlock's cheeks, welling in the hollows of his ears. At the fifteenth, his breath bursts out of him in a keening sob, and John instantly jerks back, pulling out of him.  
  
"I'm sorry," Sherlock manages to croak.  
  
"Don't apologise," John says, lifting a hand and thumbing away a tear clinging to the edge of one high cheekbone. "If it's not for you, that's okay. There are other things we can try."

 

* * *

  
  
"Like that, hmm?" John asks softly, tugging Sherlock's prepuce up over the swollen glans of his penis.  
  
From the tone, Sherlock can tell it's one part tender inquiry, one part smug gloating. Over a week of tentative experimentation, John has learned that he can dismantle the brilliant mind of Sherlock Holmes with nothing more than the low, gruff command of his voice and the ringed index finger and thumb of his left hand.  
  
"It's good, yeah?" John prompts a moment later, when Sherlock fails to answer.  
  
"Yes," Sherlock supplies, a deep, guttural rumble. "Very good." There's a nagging awareness in his brain that it's rather indecent, sitting here in his armchair with his dressing gown open and his pyjama bottoms around his ankles, John crouching over him, pouring a non-stop litany of filth into his ears as he works his prick. But there's something strangely exciting about that, something that tickles up Sherlock's spine, warm and electric.  
  
"Jesus, look at you," John remarks, curling his other fingers around Sherlock's cock and giving it a proper stroke.  
  
Sherlock moans, hips jerking up, fingers bunching in the wool of John's jumper where he's clutching at his shoulders.  
  
"You've been gagging for it all day, haven't you?"  
  
"Oh, God, _John_ ," Sherlock whines, head falling against the back of the armchair.  
  
"Yeah, c'mon," John encourages, pumping Sherlock's cock in earnest.  
  
Sherlock feels himself unspool. Heat explodes low in his groin, wracking through his body in shivery waves as his cock twitches in John's hand, then spills his release onto the pale stripe of belly exposed by his rucked-up t-shirt.  
  
John tears his hand away, undoes the zip of his jeans, and pulls out his stiff red cock. Four good, hard strokes is all it takes for him to push himself over the edge, and he groans raggedly, ejaculating onto Sherlock's belly and shirt.

 

* * *

  
  
Burying his face in the crook of John's neck, Sherlock nips the lobule of John's ear, swirls his tongue around the helix. This close, John's smell is strong and distinctive, a blend of cheap shampoo, coffee, and antiseptic. John's hands glide down Sherlock's back, whispering across purple silk, until at last they mould around his trouser-clad rump. A groan escapes Sherlock, and his knees buckle, digging into the sofa where they're spread astride John's lap.  
  
It's obvious, what John is craving, and yet seemingly cannot bring himself to request verbally. Sherlock's stomach twists a little at the sudden memory of their unsuccessful first foray into the world of anal intercourse. But there's something in the possessive pressure of John's fingers on his arse, something that bespeaks a difficult day at the surgery and a deep-seated, inexpressible need to lose himself in the body of his best-friend-turned-lover.  
  
"I want you to fuck me," Sherlock whispers into John's ear, low and rolling like distant thunder.  
  
John's grip on Sherlock's arse loosens fractionally. "I hurt you last time."  
  
"You caused me pain, yes, but you didn't _injure_ me. Besides, just the once is hardly sufficient data to go on, isn't it?"  
  
"You're equivocating and you bloody well know it, Sherlock."  
  
Leaning back, Sherlock finds John's gaze, palms smoothing from the slope of his shoulders to the centre of his chest. He lets his fingertips skate idly through the soft wrinkles in the cotton of John's plaid button-up for a moment. John, his John, so simple and yet so complex, the only mystery that he would never dream of trying to unravel.  
  
"I trust you," Sherlock says simply.  
  
John's eyes crinkle at the corners, and his lips quirk into a small, brittle smile. He bends forward, capturing Sherlock's mouth in a fiercely passionate kiss that shakes a deep, inchoate moan from Sherlock's throat.  
  
Ten minutes later, Sherlock is kneeling on his bed, John's right palm warm against the naked skin of his sacrum. Three of the fingers of John's left hand are working in and out of him with careful precision.  
  
"I found a website that said this position maximises pleasure and minimises discomfort for the recipient partner." Already, there is a dull, burning ache licking at the edges of Sherlock's consciousness, making it difficult to speak. "I concluded this would be an ideal arrangement for our first time, but alas, I confess I was overcome by...sentiment."  
  
"I know," John says, extracting his fingers. "I needed to see your face too." There's a plastic _click_ followed by a loud squirting noise, and then John's fingers are slipping inside of him once more, slick with fresh lube.  
  
A tiny fizzing spark of pleasure bursts in Sherlock's groin every time John's twisting fingers knead his prostrate. His arse feels ridiculously sloppy and open, and though there's still a fog of pain in his mind, he can't deny he's ready.  
  
"Please, John," Sherlock urges. "Do it. _Now_."  
  
"Okay," John agrees after a moment's deliberation. "Roll onto your left side and lift your leg. That'll be easiest, I think."  
  
Sherlock feels John's fingers withdraw from the clutch of his body. He flops over onto his side as instructed. Cranes his neck around and casts an impatient glare at John where he's standing at the foot of the bed. John offers Sherlock a crooked smile as he fists lubricant onto his prick, then crawls onto the bed, spooning up behind him.  
  
Dry lips brush across the nape of Sherlock's neck. John loops his arms around Sherlock's waist, the left one gently wedging itself between Sherlock's flank and arm, so that Sherlock's body weight bears down on it. "Okay?" he asks, pulling Sherlock closer, his chest fitting against the scar-strewn span of Sherlock's back.  
  
"Yes," Sherlock confirms quietly, letting his eyes slip shut.  
  
John cants his hips, nudging the tip of his penis into place against the small, twitching pucker of Sherlock's anus. Sherlock's head is a riot of activity, a buzzing beehive of frantic thought, but as much as he tries to quell his mind, to think of _John_ and only _John_ , he can't shake the blind animal panic that's gripping his heart like a cruel fist. Can't keep his breath from punching out of his lungs in a sharp hissing gasp when John's glans slips inside of him.  
  
"Oh, love, I'm sorry, I'm sorry," John croons, rubbing his left hand across Sherlock's chest soothingly. "We can stop."  
  
" _No_ ," Sherlock spits, his voice cracking around the hard kernel of fury stuck in his throat. "Just do it."  
  
And so John eases into him, slow and steady, and Sherlock whimpers and clutches at the bedcovers, determined to bear the pain even though every inch of John's ingress only adds to the sense that he's being cloven in two.  
  
"You're nearly a Vitruvian Man," Sherlock grits out. "Perfectly proportional with one rather unfortunate exception."  
  
"Most people would call it a blessing, you know," John replies, a little breathlessly.  
  
The last sliver of John's cock slides home, and Sherlock feels the soft, warm swell of John's sac nestle against his arse. "Oh, God," he groans. "Oh, _fuck_." Thick, hot tears are leaking from between his tightly-shut eyes.  
  
"Sherlock, love, listen to me," John whispers. "I know you want to give this to me, but if it's too much, we can stop. You feel amazing. Absolutely brilliant. But I want this to be as good for you as it is for me."  
  
Not for the first time in his life, Sherlock curses his body, refusing to allow it to veto the will of his mind. "Move, John." He draws a deep, stuttering breath, struggling to beat back the pain. "Your concern has been noted."  
  
A warm hand slides down Sherlock's belly. Curls around his cock and lifts it from where it's lying against his left thigh. For a minute, John just strokes him, planting soft kisses along his neck and shoulder, until finally he fills out a little. Then, and only then, does John begin fucking him, rocking in and out of his body with shallow, even thrusts.  
  
Stinging flares of pain shoot up Sherlock's spine with every movement. His cheeks are a burning, tear-sodden mess. Turning his head away from John, he buries his face against his left shoulder, vainly attempting to muffle his sobs. Worse than the pain, perhaps, is the shame and anger that attends it, the way it makes him feel tiny and pathetic.  
  
"Oh, Sherlock, you feel so good, love, so good," John murmurs, working Sherlock's cock in tandem with his thrusts. With his other hand, he pets Sherlock's chest, fingertips absorbing the galloping thud of his heart.  
  
"Harder! I'm not made of bone china!" Sherlock snarls.  
  
John stops dead, and Sherlock hears him suck in a long, steadying breath through his nostrils. His right hand frees Sherlock's half-hard prick, trails up the pale, seemingly endless stretch of his flank to join the left on his chest. For a minute, he simply traces circles over the little pink crater of Sherlock's scar, as if reaffirming Sherlock's durability. Then his hand sweeps back down Sherlock's flank to grasp the sharp jut of Sherlock's right hipbone. Slowly, he withdraws to the very tip, only to immediately snap his hips forward again, driving the full length of his cock deep inside Sherlock's body in one swift, brutal plunge. A low, satisfied groan escapes John as he does it again, and again, and again, until he's fucking in and out of Sherlock vigorously.  
  
Face still hidden against his shoulder, Sherlock bites his lower lip, his right hand tensing into a claw in the sheets. The pain mounts, rearing up like a tsunami, higher and higher, until at last it wrenches a broken cry from his throat.  
  
Pulling out abruptly, John rolls Sherlock onto his back, reaches down and swipes away a falling tear with his thumb. "It's all right, Sherlock, it's all right. You were so good, but I can't do it any more, not when I'm hurting you."  
  
Sherlock heaves in a shuddering breath, but even as John presses his lips to the corner of his right eye, kisses a reassuring path down the crest of his cheekbone, he can't displace the cold weight of failure from within his chest. Can't overcome the sense that the abominable _weakness_ of his body has once again denied John pleasure.  
  
"I'm sorry, John," Sherlock rasps.  
  
"It's okay, love," John whispers, taking Sherlock's face between his hands and carding his fingers through his curls.  
  
Silence overtakes the bedroom as they simply lay together, breathing, John's chest rising into the fall of Sherlock's. Finally, after a tiny eternity, the heat of John's arousal against his thigh becomes too much for Sherlock to ignore. Grabbing hold of John's arse and letting his legs fall open, he cants his pelvis upward, pulls John forward to meet it. Their cocks slide along each other sweetly, aided by a mixture of lube, sweat, and precome.  
  
Sherlock's breath catches. He throws his head back on the pillow, exposing the long, pale arc of his neck. John dips his head, sucking a bruise into the tender skin over Sherlock's jugular as his hips establish a slow, easy grind.  
  
"Oh, God," Sherlock gasps, a deep, quavering rumble.  
  
John growls, low and feral, and the sound of it ripples through Sherlock, making his back bow off the mattress. Already, he can feel heat pooling in his groin, feel his fingers trembling as he clings desperately to John's shoulders.  
  
"That's it, Sherlock, just let go," John coaxes.  
  
Sherlock comes with a strangled cry half a minute later, his release spattering John's belly in hot, thick pulses. It feels like he's falling apart, but John holds him through it, kisses him, the metronome of his hips never breaking its rhythm.  
  
When Sherlock floats down, he blinks open his eyes, the long lashes still slightly moist and clumped together. His body seems lighter, somehow, freed of a burden he hadn't even known that he was carrying. "John," he says, lifting a hand to cup the face smiling down at him fondly, "I believe I am sufficiently relaxed to try again."  
  
"Sherlock, I don't..." John falters.  
  
"I need it," Sherlock interjects, barely more than a breath. "Need _you_."  
  
John closes his eyes, swipes his tongue across his lower lip, and gives a small, soldierly nod.  
  
Slipping out from under John, Sherlock rolls over onto his stomach, pushes himself up onto his hands and knees. As John shifts behind him, he's struck by a sudden, intense respect for John's mastery of his own body. He's been rock-hard and leaking through all of this, and yet he hasn't pushed, has only followed Sherlock's lead.  
  
John guides his cock between Sherlock's cheeks and presses into his slackened opening carefully. Pain blossoms in Sherlock with every inch John feeds into him, creeps up his spine and chokes off his breath like a hard, cruel hand. He'd hoped that maybe, just maybe, it would be different with his brain swimming in oxytocin, dopamine, and various other neurochemicals in the wake of his release, but yet again his body is refusing to cooperate.  
  
Holding still, John spreads Sherlock's arse cheeks further apart with his hands, mutters, " _Jesus Christ_."  
  
There's something in the hoarse, possessive tone of John's voice that belies his slipping self-control, something about knowing John gets off on seeing himself buried in his lover that sends a tiny thrill coursing through Sherlock.  
  
"Christ, you're amazing, absolutely amazing and gorgeous," John says.  
  
"Fuck me," Sherlock pleads.  
  
John draws his cock out, sinks back into Sherlock's body in a deep, sinfully deliberate slide. His fingers bite into the soft flesh of Sherlock's arse cheeks, pull him into the forward drive of his hips as he sets a firm, measured tempo. "Oh, Jesus, _yes_ ," he hisses. "Holy bloody fuck, yes. So good, Sherlock, so good. So _fucking_ good."  
  
This is John's favourite position. Despite the pain slicing through his nerves, making his limbs feel alarmingly gelatinous, the fact doesn't escape Sherlock, and he files it away like a precious, hard-won secret. John is taking immense pleasure in this act, in _him_ , he reminds himself, crushing his mouth to the pillow to stifle his whimpering. The soft cream silk of the pillow sham soon becomes sodden with the tears spilling freely from his eyes.  
  
Suddenly, the last filament of Sherlock's stubborn determination snaps, and his whole body seizes and quakes. He hears a high, pathetic wail, and it takes John pulling out of his body and rolling him over onto his back and cradling him in his arms and whispering gentle, hushed nonsense for him to realise that it was his own.  
  
"Shh, love, it's alright," John assures him. "You did so well. So well. But I can't bear to hurt you like this. _I can't_."  
  
Sherlock lays there, silent, feeling his tears cool and dry on his cheeks while John kisses along the line of his jaw. He tries to let John's words fill him, tries to let them wash away his self-doubt, but there's no closing the hollowness that's opened inside his chest, no denying the truth of John's unspent cock slowly deflating against his thigh.

 

* * *

  
  
Orange light dances across the soft lines of John's face from the fire cracking in the hearth. Sherlock's heart skitters at the sight of him, slumped back in his chair, eyes shining and mouth curved into a fond and slightly cheeky grin. It feels so right, so right that two years to the day after Sherlock gifted Charles Augustus Magnussen with a bullet to the head, they should find themselves returned here, to the moment the door first opened on the possibility of _them_. And yet, somehow, with the pair of stockings dangling from the mantel (the left one, Sherlock's, weighted down by the skull), the plate of homemade shortbread biscuits on John's side-table (deposited by Mrs. Hudson earlier in the evening), and the newly-composed piece ("Rhapsody for John") on Sherlock's music stand, it seems more intimate.  
  
As if on cue, John slithers forward, plants a hand on Sherlock's knee and slides it up the length of Sherlock's thigh. Only this time Sherlock lets his legs splay open, lets his head tip back, exposing the curve of his neck.  
  
John hums, a low, approving sound. Swipes his thumb down the trouser-clad bulge of Sherlock's crotch. "I wouldn't mind, you know," he intones, the words steady and clear despite the cloying tang of scotch on his breath.  
  
Sherlock's head snaps up. His eyes seek John's, uncertain, but John merely flicks his tongue across his lower lip, then dips his chin and lifts his eyebrows in a way that teases, _You're the genius here. You figure it out._  
  
"You want me to...do _that_...to you?" Sherlock asks half a minute later.  
  
John's smile widens impossibly. "I'm offering, yeah."  
  
"But there are germs," Sherlock demurs. Then, before he can rein in his stupid, drunk tongue, he adds, "In there."  
  
"I went to bloody medical school, Sherlock. I know all about gut flora. S'why you should use a condom."  
  
"You didn't, though," Sherlock points out.  
  
"No," John says, a little too breathily to be just a simple confirmation.  
  
"You wanted to come in my arse," Sherlock goads in a dark, seductive rumble.  
  
John's tongue darts out to wet his bottom lip a second time. "Yeah."  
  
Gripping John's wrist, Sherlock drags John's hand lower, his eyes burning with naked hunger as they hold John's. John, mercifully, seizes the initiative, jabbing his thumb up into the space behind Sherlock's bollocks.  
  
"You wanted to see your ejaculate leaking out of my body. Wanted to know you'd marked me. Made me _yours_."  
  
"God, yes," John hisses, voice hoarse and desperate.  
  
"Then do it, John, take me," Sherlock implores. "Take me right here on the hearthrug."  
  
Maybe it's the alcohol buzzing through his veins, but John hesitates for only a few seconds, then firms his jaw. Springing to his feet, he seizes Sherlock by the lapels of his suit jacket, hauls him up out of his armchair. Sherlock barely has time to grab the bottle of lube stashed between the seat cushion and the back of the chair.  
  
"Get down on all fours," John orders as Sherlock presses the bottle into his palm.  
  
Sherlock nods, feeling a small, shivery spark of excitement explode in his groin at the words. He doesn't need to be told what to do, not really, but he knows how badly John needs it, this willing surrender of control. How much he needs to make the unyielding bend to his will, if only for a sliver of time, to feel some measure of power over his life. And so Sherlock falls to his knees, then levers his arse into the air, his hands supporting his upper body.  
  
John drops to the floor behind him. Rucks up his suit jacket and yanks his shirttail out of his trousers. Reaching around to Sherlock's front, he pinches the tab of his zip, but his hand stalls, and Sherlock hears him swallow thickly.  
  
"I trust you," Sherlock declares, barely more than a breath.  
  
"I know," John replies. "I'm just not sure I trust myself not to hurt you with how wankered I am right now."  
  
"I want this, John. I've wanted this for so long. Please, just do it, and don't stop this time unless I explicitly ask you to."  
  
For a half a minute, John remains silent, and Sherlock feels his heart sink. At last, he says, "Give me a safeword."  
  
"You aren't chaining me to the wall and beating me with the riding crop. I hardly think a safeword is necessary."  
  
"I am _not_ doing this without a safeword, Sherlock," John states firmly.  
  
"Fine," Sherlock relents, expelling a put-upon sigh. "Redbeard."  
  
"Redbeard," John repeats, undoing Sherlock's zip. "Good."  
  
A shiver of trepidation chases up Sherlock's spine as John pulls his trousers and pants down his arse. He wants this, yes, wants _John_ , and yet he can't stop dread from burrowing its way into his chest and stealing his breath. Can't stop his hands from tensing into claws, scoring shallow grooves into the dusty, weathered pile of the hearthrug.  
  
_You always feel it, Sherlock. But you don't have to fear it._  
  
The remembered words ring through Sherlock's mind. It's true: pain isn't something he needs to fear. Drawing a long, slow breath, he tamps down the flare of panic that ignites in his chest at the feel of a slick finger pressing to his hole.  
  
John settles his right hand in the small of Sherlock's back, rubs a gentle, soothing circle. "Okay?" he asks.  
  
"Yes," Sherlock answers evenly.  
  
Slowly, carefully, John eases his finger inside Sherlock's body. After a few tentative twists, he slips a second finger alongside the first, working the resistant muscle open with surprising finesse for a highly-intoxicated man.  
  
"I wanted this the night of my stag do," John tells him. "Didn't know if you were being thick or noble."  
  
"Bit of both, actually," Sherlock replies, biting back a wince.  
  
When John inserts a third finger, Sherlock releases a tiny, mewling sob, feeling a lone tear cut down his cheek. His fingers curl into fists, the short, blunt nails digging crescent-shaped marks into the tender flesh of his palms.  
  
"How is it so far, love?" John inquires softly.  
  
"Tolerable," Sherlock grits out.  
  
John spends the next few minutes methodically stretching Sherlock. Sherlock's wrists give out at one point, refusing to bear the weight of his upper body any longer, and he slumps forward, the side of his face pressing against the rug. A small, gentle hand cups the back of his skull, massaging his scalp and teasing through his dark shock of curls. The touch helps Sherlock transcend the stinging pain that crackles through his nerves with every swirl of John's fingers.  
  
Finally, John slides the digits out, and Sherlock hears the metallic gnash of him tearing open the zip of his jeans. "Try to relax for me, okay?" John advises, positioning the head of his cock against Sherlock's anus.  
  
"Spare me the soft touch, John," Sherlock huffs impatiently. "I want it _hard_. My body needs to learn its place."  
  
John grips Sherlock's bony hips, his thumbs digging into Sherlock's paradoxically lush arse, spreading his cheeks. Then he snaps his hips forward, plowing his cock into Sherlock's depths in a rough, relentless drive. Sherlock's breath skitters out of him in a choking sob, and he clenches his fists tighter, his thighs quivering. If anything, however, the pain is a cleansing thing, burning through his nerves and clearing his head of every last thought but _John_.  
  
"Oh, Sherlock. Jesus. _Fuck_." John gives Sherlock's hips a possessive squeeze. "You're so bloody tight."  
  
" _John_ ," Sherlock croaks, pushing his arse back feebly.  
  
A low, guttural growl answers Sherlock, and then John slides his cock out, slamming it home again savagely. Sherlock keens, but John just firms his hold on Sherlock's hips, sets a fast, brutal rhythm.  
  
"Fuck, Sherlock, holy fuck, you're so good, you're so fucking good," John bites out breathlessly.  
  
Sherlock screws his eyes closed on a gasping sob, heaves in sharp, staccato breaths through his nostrils. Tears are sluicing down his cheeks now, soaking into the worn hearthrug, but there's nothing for it. Nothing to do but clamp his jaw shut against the pain screaming up his spine and let John crash into him over and over. The pain is the thin line between living and dying, breathing and choking, splashes of red against the flat grey canvas of everyday sensation. It's being pushed to the brink of the humanity from which he's tried to escape for most of his adult life.  
  
"Oh, Jesus Christ, Sherlock. Jesus-fucking-Christ. You're amazing, love, just amazing, taking this for me."  
  
Overtaken and overwhelmed, Sherlock whines brokenly, surrendering himself to the ruthless pistoning of John's cock. John's words are a bright, golden fibre threading through the tangled skein of his thoughts, an undeniable, incandescent truth knitting itself deep into the rough and uneven weave of his heart.  
  
"You're everything, Sherlock. Brilliant and beautiful and brave, and Christ, I love you _so fucking much_."  
  
"John!" Sherlock cries, and then he's coming, impossibly, his whole body quaking with the force of it. Fists pounding the floor as he sobs and wails and spatters his release across the hearthrug in thick white spurts. It feels as if he's dying, as if he's plunging off the roof of a building all over again, and John doesn't let up, keeps fucking into him. Pushes him far, far past his limit, until he feels that he's cried every last tear that he has to shed.  
  
John reaches his own peak two minutes later, cursing and growling, his fingers biting bruises into Sherlock's hips. Sherlock gasps at the rhythmic throbbing of John's prick inside him, at the sudden, warm flush of his release. Holding him still, John empties everything he has to give into Sherlock, then collapses onto Sherlock's back.  
  
"I love you," Sherlock whispers. It's not the first time he's said it, not by any means, but the words are still pure on his tongue. He feels rent open, mind, heart, and sinew, and yet he can't imagine himself wanting anything different.  
  
For a long moment, John rests his forehead against Sherlock's back, nuzzling his nose into Sherlock's suit jacket. Then, at last, he draws himself upright once more, warning, "I'm going to pull out now."  
  
Sherlock winces as John disengages from his body, leaving him feeling sore, open, and deliciously used. Hands pry his arse cheeks apart, and he hears John's breath catch at the thin, still-warm trickle of semen leaking out of him. John allows himself to silently drink in the sight for half a minute before releasing Sherlock's cheeks. Boneless and deeply sated, Sherlock flops onto his belly, then uses his elbows to flip himself over onto his back.  
  
Smiling down at Sherlock, John cups the long, thin face, tracks his thumb over pale skin still clammy with drying tears.  
  
"Merry Christmas," Sherlock says, and for the first time in his life the greeting feels sincere.


End file.
